Analysts mulling over Nokia’s IP infringment suit against Apple seem to be of two minds about how the action will play out. There are those, like Neil Mawston at Strategy Analytics and Ben Wood at CCS Insight, who warn that Apple (AAPL) is on dangerous ground here at best. It’s almost impossible to build a cellphone without using Nokia’s (NOK) intellectual property, they claim. And if that’s the case with the iPhone, then Apple could end up paying Nokia hundreds of millions of dollars in licensing fees if Cupertino ends up on the losing side of this suit. (Click on text image below to see list of patents at issue.)

Some analysts, like Maynard Um of UBS, see Nokia’s action as a preemptory move against a possible infringement suit from Apple aimed at Nokia’s own multitouch handsets.

“We believe Nokia’s suit could be a pre-emptive move ahead of its new handsets launching soon that may have multi-touch capabilities for which Apple has IP,” Um wrote in a note to clients this morning. “We would not be surprised if Apple eventually files an infringement suit if Nokia’s handsets are deemed to infringe its IP and we believe Nokia would prefer any court action to be combined as prior cases have been. We expect the legal process to be drawn out & could involve US Patent Office reviews.”

The endgame here? Most likely an out-of-court settlement and cross-licensing agreements–assuming Apple’s willing. After all, Nokia is on record admitting its fondness for Apple’s technology.

Asked once about the striking similarities between a touchscreen device it was designing and Apple’s iconic handset, Anssi Vanjoki, Nokia’s head of multimedia devices replied, “If there is something good in the world then we copy with pride.”

Check out the video:

Today, the Finnish cellphone giant, which has been struggling to develop a worthy competitor to the iPhone, filed suit against Apple, claiming the popular smart phone infringes upon a number of Nokia patents.

Specifically at issue here: 10 patents covering various wireless data, speech coding, security and encryption technologies. Nokia claims that every iPhone model shipped since 2007 has violated them.

“The basic principle in the mobile industry is that those companies who contribute in technology development to establish standards create intellectual property, which others then need to compensate for,” said Ilkka Rahnasto, vice president of legal & intellectual property at Nokia (NOK). “Apple is also expected to follow this principle. By refusing to agree appropriate terms for Nokia’s intellectual property, Apple is attempting to get a free ride on the back of Nokia’s innovation.”

To that point, Nokia says it has entered into license agreements with about 40 companies for these patents. Only Apple (AAPL) has refused. The obvious endgame here, then, is to force the iPhone maker to change its mind.

“We believe that Nokia is not seeking an injunction; rather, we believe that the company has been in talks with Apple concerning a patent royalty payment for over a year,” Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster said in a bulletin to clients. “With today’s announcement, it appears that the companies have not come to a resolution and Nokia is attempting to hasten the process. Nokia is likely looking to obtain a patent royalty of 1-2 percent ($6 to $12) on every iPhone sold in compensation for its IPs concerning GSM, 3G and WiFi technologies on mobile devices.”

Interesting that news of the suit comes just days after Apple announced its most successful financial quarter ever at a time when Nokia is posting nasty losses.

I’ve asked Apple for comment and will update here if I’m offered one.

“On my birth certificate, under my father’s occupation, it says cowboy. So I will admit to being a cowboy, but not sue-happy.”

– Former SCO CEO Darl McBride, November 2003

Looks like Darl McBride, SCO’s “sue-happy cowboy” CEO, has seen his last roundup. In a new 8-K filing with the Security and Exchange Commission, the company reveals that under the order of a bankruptcy court, it has eliminated the chief executive officer and president positions and consequently sacked McBride.

Which means SCO’s seemingly endless legal campaign may have finally found its end. For though the company says it plans to pursue litigation against IBM (IBM) and Novell (NOVL), there seems little promise in it now. SCO is mired in bankruptcy. It’s evidently still unable to prove that Linux illegally contains its UNIX System V source code. And now it has fired the guy who devoted the past six years attempting to do just that.

And, frankly, SCO is better off for it. As Free Software Foundation General Counsel Eben Moglen once said, “As an amateur scholar of constitutional law, Mr. McBride is longer than he is deep.” And this does appear to be the case. Because despite vast swaths of evidence to the contrary, McBride always appeared certain that SCO had successfully defended its intellectual property in court.

“We’ve obviously overachieved on that objective,” McBride said of SCO’s efforts to defend against IBM’s alleged intellectual property infringements in 2004. “If I had to make this decision [to sue IBM] ten times over, the decision would be the same one ten times. Big Blue is no doubt a formidable opponent and we still expect to win. Keep your eye on the [court] filings. Over the coming year, one of the things that you’re going to see is that Big Blue has got big problems.”

Obviously, Big Blue wasn’t the one with the big problems.

But perhaps those restrictions were better left in place. Because on Thursday, the DOJ opened a preliminary investigation into IBM’s business practices, seeking to determine if the company has abused its monopoly position in the mainframe market. The inquiry stems from a complaint filed by the Computer and Communications Industry Association that claims IBM (IBM) has undermined sales of competing mainframe hardware products by refusing to license its mainframe operating system and certain other intellectual property.

“IBM has used its power to resurrect and create a formidable set of barriers in the mainframe market by their misuse of intellectual property,” CCIA CEO Edward J. Black, told the New York Times. “Once IBM walls are taken down by the government enforcing the law, there will be a rush of people looking to get part of this marketplace.”

Perhaps. Certainly that’s not really the case now. As the CCIA and T3 Technologies–which filed an antitrust complaint against IBM in Europe earlier this year for similar reasons–would argue, IBM has essentially left the industry with a single mainframe vendor: itself. And if that sounds like an exaggeration, consider this: A few years back, a company called Platform Solutions attempted to license IBM’s mainframe software. IBM refused and then sued Platform, accusing it of a raft of IP-related violations. Platform countersued. And then, in 2008, IBM acquired the company and promptly shut down its operations.

“For decades, IBM licensed its system software and intellectual property to other computer manufacturers,” T3 president Steven Friedman said earlier this year. “However, for no reason other than to remove all competition from the mainframe market, IBM eliminated programs to allow customers to buy its mainframe software for use on non-IBM mainframe solutions….[Now] only IBM…offers IBM- compatible mainframes and, based on IDC reports, controls over 99% of all existing IBM-compatible mainframes in use today.”

Sewell joined Intel (INTC) in 1995 as a senior attorney and was named general counsel in 2004. In that capacity, he managed Intel’s antitrust battles in Japan, Korea, the United States and now, the European Union as well. At Apple (AAPL), he succeeds Daniel Cooperman, who will retire at month’s end.

“We are thrilled to have Bruce join our executive team, and wish Dan a very happy retirement,” Apple CEO Steve Jobs said in a statement. “With Bruce’s extensive experience in litigation, securities and intellectual property, we expect this to be a seamless transition.”

It would seem, then, that Sewell’s decision to leave Intel for Apple is more train-hopping than anything else. And while it certainly comes at a lousy time for Intel, it’s not likely indicative of some upset within the company’s legal department.

As Insight 64 analyst Nathan Brookwood told me this morning, “Some personnel changes result from the circumstances of the individuals involved, rather than high level machinations within the organizations to which they belong. Cooperman’s retirement created the opening at Apple, a position Sewell is well qualified to fill. My bottom line: Bruce’s move has more to do with Apple’s need for a top notch lawyer than with Intel’s current legal situation.”

The official announcement, below.

Bruce Sewell to Join Apple as General Counsel & SVP

Daniel Cooperman to Retire

CUPERTINO, Calif., Sept. 15 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Apple today announced that Bruce Sewell, formerly senior vice president and general counsel of Intel Corporation (INTC), will join Apple as the company’s General Counsel and senior vice president, Legal and Government Affairs, reporting to Apple CEO Steve Jobs. Daniel Cooperman, who has served in these roles at Apple for the past two years, will be retiring at the end of September.

“We are thrilled to have Bruce join our executive team, and wish Dan a very happy retirement,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “With Bruce’s extensive experience in litigation, securities and intellectual property, we expect this to be a seamless transition.”

At Intel, Sewell has been responsible for leading all of Intel’s legal, corporate affairs and corporate social responsibility programs, managing attorneys and policy professionals located in over 30 countries around the world. He joined Intel in 1995 as a senior attorney assigned to counsel various business groups in areas such as antitrust compliance, licensing and intellectual property. In 2001, Sewell was promoted to vice president and deputy general counsel, managing Intel’s litigation portfolio, and handled corporate transactions including M&A activities.

Prior to joining Intel, he was a partner in the litigation firm of Brown and Bain PC. Sewell was admitted to the California Bar in 1986 and to the Washington D.C. Bar in 1987. He received his J.D. from George Washington University in 1986, and a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Lancaster, in the United Kingdom, in 1979.

TiVo’s (TIVO) complaint seeks both damages for past infringement and a permanent injunction–similar to the one it won against satellite provider Dish Network (DISH)–that would force AT&T (T) and Verizon (VZ) to shut down their DVR services.

“Attempts were made to reach a commercial arrangement,” TiVo CEO Tom Rogers said during an earnings call today. “They were not reached. We believe we are being caused irreparable harm and that harm increases everyday this doesn’t cease. We have found ourselves in a similar situation with AT&T and Verizon. We need to stop their continued unauthorized use of our intellectual property.”

And, God willing, corral them into that commercial arrangement to which Rogers refers. After all, the company lost 146,000 subscribers in its second quarter. It desperately needs to do something to win new ones and lower its churn.

[Image credit: Flickr/montevino]

“For the last several months, we have consistently stated and maintained that our System V code is in Linux,” McBride explained. “The claims SCO has are both broad and deep. These claims touch not just IBM but other vendors as well. They also touch certain industry consortia and corporate Linux end users. Our claims aren’t trivial. The violations of our intellectual property are not easily repaired. It is our intention to vigorously protect and enforce SCO’s intellectual property, System V source code and our copyrights. We’re now fully prepared to do that.”

And they did. SCO subsequently filed suit against IBM (IBM), auto giant DaimlerChrysler and a coterie of other companies, each time sounding the same theme: Our copyrighted UNIX code was illegally cobbled into Linux. You’re using it without a license. Pay up.

But SCO never specified exactly the Linux code it believes infringes on its copyrights, even in the face of repeated calls to do so from its defendants and the open source community. Indeed, it could be said that the company’s legal campaign against Linux was defined by its utter failure to prove that the open-source operating system contains any of its intellectual property. Certainly, that was the opinion of the U.S. District Court for the District of Utah, which found that the copyright to UNIX and UnixWare was owned by Novell. That decision drove SCO into bankruptcy and ended its high-profile legal attack on Linux.

But only for a time. Because a federal appeals court on Monday ruled that SCO is entitled to a jury trial on its claims to Unix, a ruling that might lead to a renewal of the company’s campaign against Linux. “We take no position on which party ultimately owns the Unix copyrights or which copyrights were required for Santa Cruz to exercise its rights under the agreement,” the court wrote in its ruling. “Such matters are for the finder of fact on remand.”

And so, astonishingly, this six-year battle is headed back to court once again, a development Darl McBride was quick to spin as a vindication in one of his typically pontifical pronouncements. “Today is not the end of the war but it certainly is a key battle that we’ve won,” he said of the decision. “Now it’s time to move on to the next series of battles with our victory in hand.”

Of course, for events to play out that way, SCO must prove that Unix contains its intellectual property, something it has so far failed abysmally to do. Indeed, the judge presiding over the original case compared SCO’s claims to those of a store owner accusing someone of shoplifting but refusing to say what items had been stolen. As Linux creator Linus Torvalds once said, “There really is a reason why nobody believes a word SCO is saying, and it’s because SCO is lying.”

In August 2007, just after former Apple exec Jon Rubinstein joined Palm, Apple CEO Steve Jobs warned Palm CEO Ed Colligan against poaching his company’s employees. “We must do whatever we can to stop this,” he said, according to communications reviewed by Bloomberg. Colligan declined. “Your proposal that we agree that neither company will hire the other’s employees, regardless of the individual’s desires, is not only wrong, it is likely illegal,” he told the Apple CEO, noting–ironically–that Cupertino had hired away some two percent of Palm’s workforce as it began developing the iPhone.

And that’s proven a wise move. Today, the U.S. Department of Justice is investigating just such gentleman’s agreements as a collusive restraint on trade. And Palm (PALM) and Apple (AAPL) are sparring over intellectual property and the Pre handset, which Apple claims “falsely pretends to be an iPod.” How convenient for Palm that these communications should emerge now when its Cupertino rival is giving it such a hard time. And such a distraction for Apple legal….

Of course, Jobs was right to worry. Within a year of his warning to Colligan, Palm hired away Mike Bell and Lynn Fox, Apple VP of CPU software in the Macintosh hardware division and head of Mac PR respectively, among others hired later. And within two years, Palm debuted a new handset that some consider a worthy rival to the Apple iPhone.

Nortel Networks has rejected Research In Motion’s bid for the wireless infrastructure assets Nortel is unloading as part of bankruptcy proceedings. RIM said Monday night that it intended to offer $1.1 billion for Nortel’s CDMA and LTE businesses, but was told it could do so only if it agreed not to bid on other Nortel assets, something it had intended to do.

In a blistering statement, RIM (RIMM) accused Nortel (NT) of imposing unfair conditions on the court-supervised auction of its assets and of jeopardizing their continued Canadian ownership.

“RIM is extremely disappointed that Nortel’s world leading technology, the development of which has been funded in part by Canadian taxpayers, seems destined to leave Canada,” said co-CEO Jim Balsillie. “RIM remains extremely interested in acquiring Nortel assets through a Canadian ownership solution that would serve the dual purpose of keeping key wireless technologies in Canada and extending RIM’s leadership in the research, development and distribution of leading edge wireless solutions, but RIM has found itself blocked at every turn.”

Why? Nortel says RIM was late to the game and hasn’t followed proper auction procedure.

“Other parties moved expeditiously to comply with the court approved procedures to become a qualified bidder,” the company said in a statement. “It was not until July 15, 2009, that RIM submitted a letter to Nortel asking to be a qualified bidder and since that time, Nortel has diligently attempted to work with RIM on acceptable confidentiality terms relating to Nortel’s valuable intellectual property assets, but RIM refused to comply with the court approved procedures.”

What’s really going on here? It’s hard to say, though clearly there’s more to the story. After all, RIM’s $1.1 billion bid is far, far more than Nokia Siemens’s stalking horse bid of $650 million. And what does RIM want with the CDMA business, anyway?

But in the end, the maker of the BlackBerry line of smart phones ended up licensing them anyway.

This morning, RIM said it will pay Visto $267.5 million to resolve the long-running patent dispute and purchase a license for the intellectual property at issue. The deal, expected to close next week, will end all lawsuits still in court, resolving an issue that, had it turned truly ugly, could have shut down RIM’s BlackBerry email service.

How quickly things changed. By 2007, Davidson had been joined by 11 other lobbyists, among them a former high-ranking Justice Department antitrust lawyer. And now, two years later, Google CEO Eric Schmidt has been named by President Obama to his Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. In that role he’ll work with a group of distinguished academics and executives–a group that, incidentally, includes Craig Mundie, chief research and strategy officer at Microsoft (MSFT)–to help the administration “formulate policy in the many areas where understanding of science, technology, and innovation is key to strengthening our economy and forming policy that works for the American people.”

Schmidt’s appointment isn’t all that surprising. He served as an informal adviser to Obama during his campaign and he’s a smart guy who’s got some strong opinions about network neutrality, next-generation broadband, and intellectual property–issues that figure high on the president’s tech agenda. Still, it’s one more indication–and the biggest one yet–that Google has become firmly part of the Washington establishment.

At issue here are two Elan patents. The first–the company’s so called ’352 or “multi-finger” patent–describes a “multiple fingers contact sensing method for emulating mouse buttons and mouse operations on a touch sensor pad.” The second, or ’353 patent, describes a a “capacitive touchpad integrated with key and handwriting functions.”

“The ’352 patent is a fundamental patent to the detection of multiple fingers on a touchpad or touch-sensitive input device to enable the detection and use of a multi-finger gestures in various applications,” Elan claims in its suit. “Apple has been on notice of its infringement of the ’352 patent since early 2007 and has continued to utilize the ’352 patent invention without authorization. In addition, the Apple iPhone and iPod Touch also permit users to switch the capacitive touchscreen between keyboard and handwriting modes, and thus falls under the scope of the ’353 patent.”

Interesting claims. Especially since Elan issued a statement back in February dismissing the idea that there might be some overlap between its multi-finger patent and Apple’s 949 “multi-touch” patent. From that statement:

Some market experts have expressed that the issue of Apple’s multi-touch patent might adversely affect ELAN’s competitiveness in the multi-touch market in some way. ELAN … feels that the market has over estimated Apple’s 949 patent. The content of the 949 patent is quite broad and widespread as it might seem like an iPhone user’s manual. However, the final scope of claim granted is mainly based on an angle of initial movement of a finger contact with respect to the touch screen display to determined one or two dimensional command. Although the patent comprises of 20 items covering software, firmware, and memory storage, its scope is actually limited within the establishment of the one and two-dimensional commands mechanism. Simply speaking, it emphasizes more on one or two-dimensional commands finger gesture recognition rather than about multi-touch technology. Hence, to make things unmistakably clear, having a multi-touch feature can not be interpreted as an infringement of the 949 patent. 

As to the ongoing reports that Apple’s 949 patent will have an unfavorable blow to ELAN’s competitiveness, ELAN explains that there is actually no conflict between the multi-touch technologies used by ELAN and Apple. None of ELAN’s current customers are using or plan to adopt the patent claim in the future. Therefore, the approval of the 949 patent will have no adverse effect on ELAN’s expanding Multi-Finger™ market. As to the 949 patent’s market value, ELAN feels that the general consumers, as viewed by the major players in the handset industry, are not enthusiastic or feel the need of operating their mobile phones with the “one and two-dimensional” commands.

An odd thing to say two months before filing suit against the company with which you purportedly have no conflict, don’t you think? I wonder what changed…

We like competition, as long as they don’t rip off our IP, and if they do, we’re going to go after anybody that does….We will not stand for having our IP ripped off and we’ll use whatever weapons we have at our disposal [to make sure that doesn't happen]. I don’t know that I can be more clear than that.”

– Apple COO Tim Cook’s on the company’s iPhone intellectual property

Turns out that when Apple (AAPL) COO Tim Cook said the company would use “whatever weapons we have at our disposal” to pursue anyone who “rips off” Apple’s iPhone intellectual property, he had a very specific weapon in mind: United States Patent #7,479,949. Awarded just days before Cook made that statement, the vast 358-page patent describes the touchscreen, graphical user interface and technologies that define the iPhone user experience, including at least one that may define an element of the Palm (PALM) Pre’s as well. From the patent abstract:

A computer-implemented method for use in conjunction with a computing device with a touch screen display comprises: detecting one or more finger contacts with the touch screen display, applying one or more heuristics to the one or more finger contacts to determine a command for the device, and processing the command. The one or more heuristics comprise: a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a one-dimensional vertical screen scrolling command, a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a two-dimensional screen translation command, and a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a command to transition from displaying a respective item in a set of items to displaying a next item in the set of items.

Also described in the patent, a gesture area separate from the iPhone touchscreen UI itself:

In some embodiments, in addition to the touch screen, the device 100 may include a touchpad (not shown) for activating or deactivating particular functions. In some embodiments, the touchpad is a touch-sensitive area of the device that, unlike the touch screen, does not display visual output. The touchpad may be a touch-sensitive surface that is separate from the touch screen 112 or an extension of the touch-sensitive surface formed by the touch screen.

A touch-sensitive area of the device that, unlike the touchscreen, does not display visual output. Hmm. That sounds awfully familiar, doesn’t it? Where have I heard that before… Oh, I know, in Palm’s announcement of the Pre.

Palm Pre features include the following:

…Gesture area, which enables simple, intuitive gestures for navigation”

Makes you wonder what’s going on in the bowels of Apple legal right now, doesn’t it? Palm legal, too. The company could certainly challenge the validity of the patent if it chose to.

PREVIOUSLY:

• Palm to Apple: Bring It
• Apple COO: “We Will Not Stand for Having Our IP Ripped Off”